You can get members of different parties under the same roof, but that doesn't mean they'll get along.

The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts experienced two very different sets of Washington's political elite Friday night: While the first family attended a dance performance in the Center's main theater, an impressive showing of Republicans gathered on the top floor to take in the premiere of "Ronald Reagan: Rendezvous with Destiny," a new film narrated by Newt and Callista Gingrich which paints a glowing portrait of our 40th president.

While Barack, Michelle, Sasha and Malia were treated like rock stars down below, it was Ronald Reagan being toasted up above by such GOP notables as Mr. and Mrs. Gingrich, George Allen, Ollie North, Bob Livingston, Al Regnery, Craig Shirley, David Bossie, Saul Anuzis, Jim Pinkerton and Fred Thompson.

"It's so good to finally be around Republicans!" rejoiced one attendee, and indeed the entire Reagan crowd seemed relieved to be among their own after a brutal week spent on Capitol Hill debating the stimulus bill.

And, while news of a deal in the Senate late Friday made its way to attendees of the film, it didn't spark a bipartisan feel among the film's viewers: Following an admission by ABC News' Sam Donaldson (a frequent thorn in Reagan's side during press conferences) that "I actually liked Ronald Reagan," former Reagan adviser Frank Donatelli told the crowd, "If Sam Donaldson can make amends with President Reagan, we can have a détente with House Republicans and President Obama, don't you think?"

Not so much, according to the crowd, which answered his query with boos and hisses. "Frank, it's not that funny!" shouted one audience member.

The screening of "Rendezvous," which follows the arc of Reagan's life from Dixon, Illinois, to the White House, took place on what would have been Reagan's 98th birthday and Bossie, whose conservative organization Citizens United produced the film, called The Gipper America's "original 'Yes We Can!' president."

"It would have been nice" if Obama had swung up for a peak at the film, Gingrich told Politico. "He could have learned something."

Not that the 44th president would have found a receptive audience: The event was part screening, part Republican revival, with the crowd laughing during parts of the film featuring regular Republican targets of the era — among them Jimmy Carter, Dan Rather and a pesky State Department set on softening Reagan's rhetoric — and bursting into applause during both Reagan's "Tear down this wall, Mr. Gorbachev!" speech and at the conclusion of the film.

In addition, many in the audience were brought to tears during some of Reagan's more personal moments in office. The Iran-contra scandal – deemed "the most serious mistake of his presidency" in the film by narrator Gingrich — occupied less than a minute of screen time, and was quickly explained away by Gingrich, namely because "Reagan took full responsibility" for his mistakes.